fish stuff

The tank has been driving me nuts. Lots of algae for the past 2 months.












So we bought two of these cute little Brazilian filter-feeding shrimp. They are siiiiiiiick (as the kids say these days). They seemed to help, but there is still lots of suspended algae.














Awwwwwww....what a cute little hand in the rainbow.

Wow - 2 posts in one day...

OK, so it has been a long time again. Work has been crazy busy. I have been stressed. I gained about 10 pounds...did a lot of sleeping (or feeling sleepy anyway)... Now I've lost the weight...for the most part. I feel better anyway. I've started to do a bit of excercise, but it's hard to find the motivation. The short daylight period defintely does NOT help.

We are trying to sell our house and it is supposed to be listed tomorrow! The pics are being taken tomorrow morning and the signs are going up on the front lawn and on the back fence. We had to do a few days worth of work in order for us to be comfortable in selling it. H painted the main floor bathroom, I finished the trim in the ensuite and I finished the tiling around the fireplace. It all looks great.

















A is talking like crazy now. She's sleeping in a toddler bed too! It was a tough transition for a few days, but she goes right to bed fairly easily now.

E is still talking like crazy. We've had to deal with a few 'fibbing' issues this year, but whatever, he's developing his independence. He just had a concert...cute to see them all up there singin'. We just started watching Harry Potter - The Philosopher's Stone this morning before work. He thought that was pretty great.

The car is running better now. I had to get the timing adjusted recently because it was advanced about 4 degrees too far, which I think caused too much knock and then rough running because it destroyed one plug...luckily no engine damage.

I am having steering issues. I had to replace a tie-rod (below...attached to steering)...no biggie...that only cost about $40 and about 1 hour of my time.






























Unfortunately the CV boot is torn too. All the grease has made its way out of the boot and is now all over the wheel. And of course the ubiquitous salt and dirt has made its way into the joint. I'll have to work on it in the spring...kinda a big job. It sounds terrible right now.

There was an incredible snow storm a couple of weeks ago. LOTS of snow. Fun to drive in! Woohoo all wheel drive!
















I wanted to install my SAFC-II tonight, but I need sleep...

Cheers
T

OK fine. You win...I'll post.

4 Jobs I’ve had in my Life
McDonald's cashier at the late night drive-thru (worst job EVER)
General labourer (including driving tractors and skidsteer loaders) and salesperson at a tree nursery
Plant tissue culture lab technician
Microscopist that identified asbestos fibres and airborne mould spores

4 Movies I could Watch Over and Over, and Have
The Princess Bride
So, I Married an Axe Murderer
Top Gun (got it on DVD from my kids this year)
Any Indiana Jones movie (got a box set from H last year)

4 Places I Have Lived
Sherbrooke
Fredericton
Edmonton
Guelph

4 TV Shows I Love To Watch
Desperate Housewives
Kids in the Hall
The Simpsons
Anything with fast cars in it

4 Places I Have Been On Vacation
Morocco
Iceland
Gaspé
Florida

4 Websites I Visit Daily
http://www.ca.dsm.org/cgi/ultimatebb.cgi?
http://login.passport.net/uilogin.srf?id=2
http://www.inspection.gc.ca
http://bnjendouble.blogspot.com

4 Favourite Foods
H's cashew pilaf
H's risotto with feta and carrots
BBQ chicken legs
Does red wine count?

4 Places I Would Rather Be Right Now
At home with the fam
At the new place with the fam
Out to dinner with the fam
Vacationing with the fam

4 People I Am Tagging With This
no one

fuel pump is FINALLY in!

as many of you know...I have been waiting to put in my fuel pump ever since I got the dang car! well, i put it in recently. wow does it ever run well now! i just have to put in my SAFC2 so that I can tune the car to run leaner (less fuel) at idle, cruise and mid-throttle, and a bit richer (more fuel) at full throttle. it has proven to be much more fun to drive lately!!!!!

"messy" stamp

so yesterday, E came home with a page of pictures that he was supposed to colour. well, I guess he was in a rush or something cause he scribbled the crayon on each... so the teacher puts a "Messy" stamp on the sheet. E was devestated. I mean...imagine...as a 5 year old all the stamps you are used to seeing are stars, or happy faces, but now there is one with an unhappy face with scribbles on a few places.

like this one, but much meaner...









Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!!

So, I just thought that this was totally hilarious...I almost feel bad for them...








Now here is something just amazing. Talk about a dream car...
































Here is a spec list:

Exterior:
-- Hot Red Mica paint (by PPG)
-- Carbon fiber roof panel
-- Carbon fiber hood
-- Carbon fiber front fenders
-- Carbon fiber front and rear fascias
-- Carbon fiber rear wing
-- Carbon fiber mirrors
-- 20 x 9 carbon fiber wheels
-- AVS Sport 255/35R20 Yokohama tires

Interior:
-- Recaro leather and Alcanterra trimmed seats
-- Custom harness bar
-- Four-point harnesses
-- Rear seat delete
-- Rear seat filler panel with integrated storage
-- Lancer Evolution steering wheel
-- Racing gauges
-- Rockford Fosgate sound system

Performance:
-- Turbocharged 4G63 engine (inline 4-cyl.)
-- Estimated 400 hp
-- All-wheel drive
-- HKS turbocharger kit
-- HKS 264 cams
-- Custom 2.75-inch turbo-back exhaust
-- Custom air intake
-- ARP head studs
-- HKS air-fuel controller
-- High-flow fuel pump
-- High-flow injectors
-- HKS dyno tuned
-- Endeavor rear suspension
-- Lancer Evolution VIII rear differential
-- Evo VIII MR 6-speed manual transmission
-- RPS triple plate carbon-fiber clutch
-- Road Race Engineering/Muellerized coil-over kit
-- Brembo brakes:
front: 8-piston calipers, 15-inch slotted rotors
rear: 4-piston calipers, 13.5-inch slotted rotors

new happenings.........

So we put an offer in on a different house. We must thank my parents so much for this. They have helped us a lot and we wouldn't be able to afford this house otherwise (nor the current one that we are in...).

This place is a bit south of the city, but maybe only 5 or 10 minutes mroe to drive. It could certainly be called rural...it is on a drilled well, septic system and oil heat. We have looked into the oil heating thing...for a while we thought we would either convert it, or buy something else. As it turns out, new oil furnaces are much more efficient that gas furnaces. That's good. Plus our short term goal is to supplement our electricity with solar panels. For only a few thousand, we can likely produce enough to supply most of our demands. The province has a program called 'net metering' for which they only bill you for the 'net' amount of electricity that you need to use from them...hence the name.

Anyhow...here are the pics.

click it to enlarge!













click it to enlarge!


I will post more later...

spiders

So there's this dude (or dudette) spider hanging out in our backyard. He/she has three separate (and HUGE) webs. It's big enough to freak you out if you are just casually walking down the stairs to the deck and BAHBAHHHH, SPIDER! Man. Gives me the willies just thinking about it.

we're aquarists...just another way to say "we're geeks"

We LOVE being geeks... ;-D

been a while

so. not much is too new... i just realized that i haven't posted anything for over a month!

we bought an aquarium! some of you have seen the pics. for those who haven't, i will put some up shortly! we now have 14 fish! there are 4 platys, 5 guppies, 2 black phantom tetras, 2 orthorincus and 1 plecostomus ('the monster fish' as e puts it). i took a while building the stand...but all in all i'm pretty happy with it considering the time that i put into it.

re: the house below. it just got moved back a few feet and they built a concrete foundation. there wasn't one there before. there's a little cracking along one corner of the house, but no biggie. i'd take pics, but the traffic has been nuts up there. i stay away at all costs. there is a bus only lane that is going up W avenue. cool. there is also a bike lane that is separate just like up G avenue.

i put a 12" subwoofer and an amp into the talon. it sounds great in there. the funniest thing is that the woofer itself was the first one i ever bought and in fact it was installed into my parents' car way back when i first started driving in high school...still sounds great. it looks a little 'ghetto' but whatever. i don't care.

just a couple pics

I have been meaning to take some pics of the car at night...but never find a good spot (haven't looked either). I had just finished replacing my alternator...*groan*...good thing I had the old one hanging around!!! all in all it only took about 2 hours start to finish!









Here's the 'alleged house'...still not moved!

went on vacation to 'the lake' last week!

one of many fabulous sunsets...
















i just love the tiny details in things, this is just an example...we were building trenches and dams and reservoirs...great fun!


















see! we have beaches and blue sky here!















one of the many [CRAZY] storms that we had while we were there. i love the clouds!














the calm after the storm!














storm #2! again, crazy cloud formations...















a salt mine repository...apparently the salt is mined from kilometers under the water!!!!! then it is refined and loaded onto export ships -- this particular shipping line used to be owned by *the* Martin family.

more pictures!

this is the 'other car...'

it is certainly nice and clean in this picture. i mean, WHY would you buy an AWD car if you didn't take it into the mud!!!










See, doesn't that just look right?!?

Much better!!!!!! :o)

insect pics

dragonfly nymph













Dicerca variacata














Photuris sp. - firefly















a little 'dune' coleopteran













member of the Sphingidae - Sphinx moths
possibly a Paonias sp.?













member of Cerambycidae
possibly a Graphisursus fasciatus













i was told to add some pics, so i did!

my back hurts & the new clutch rocks the casbah

so it was really nice weather on the weekend. cool air and clear skies!! so nice that it wasn't roasting like previously. i did some gardening, cleaned up the garage, put up some shelves (in the garage and inside too). all in all a good time. however, i did hurt my back from lifting the engine into the car. seems to be getting better now.

so, i did a clutch drop over the weekend...i revved it up to about 5000, then let out the clutch pedal really quickly...and it chirped the front tires and then took off like a rocket.






the old clutch had no hope of doing that...what a sorry, tired old thing. i think i'll have to slip the clutch a little bit to preserve the drivetrain. good to know that there is some decent clamping power in there now.
















i think that i need to get the fuel going properly...it seems to pull the timing like crazy when it gets warm. i need to log that thing!! as soon as i get my logger back, i hope to solve that problem and get the boost turned back up! i am only running it at about 8 psi right now...*sigh*.

maybe i should see if i have an EPROM ecu...that would make things much easier.

brought the 'poop' engine home today

man oh man am i aching...

i brought the old engine home from the shop today...owwwww. talk about messy. talk about oily. talk about AWKWARD... (ok ok sicko's, i'm talking about the engine...)



the car handled it just fine on the way home. i thought it would be more weighed down. the hard part was getting it into a proper position for me to pull it out of the car by myself. that was interesting. good thing I have an engine stand already!!!! it's surprisingly easy to move around on that stand, albeit a weeeee bit heavy.


now i need to pull it apart to see all the damage...*edit* you'll probably notice that cylinders 1&4 look a little oily...that's where i expect to see most of the damage...